First Training Camp in Whistler Huge Success

For the fourth time already the US Biathlon Team trained on the biathlon tracks of next year's Olympic Winter Games. Despite the Canadians no other world class team spent so many hours of training on the Olympic courses - an advantage that already showed three months ago when Jeremy Teela finished on the podium during the Whistler Biathlon World Cup. So getting to know the courses and conditions even more probably isn't the worst plan. "I think since it is the fourth time in Whistler the athletes really got used to the tracks and internalized them", explains High Performance Director Bernd Eisenbichler the advantages of realizing the camp in Whistler.

The team spent four days skiing around Mt Washington on Vancouver Island where they will also spend the pre-Olympic training camp and then had another eight days of training in Whistler Olympic Park. Getting back to work felt pretty good after some weeks of not touching the rifle and skis: "It feels good to be back in the swing of things with training and it is especially motivating training on the same trails that will hold the Olympics this winter" said Tim Burke after skiing his first kilometers on skis in Whistler.

Perfect conditions
Although it was already May and spring, the conditions in Whistler were surprisingly good so the team took advantage of that and spent almost three hours on skis every morning. Eisenbichler knows that it was mainly the help of the local organizers that made the camp a success: "We really had a great training camp and were quite lucky with the weather and the conditions. A big "Thank you!" goes out to Max Saenger and Colin Bell at Whistler Olympic Park as well as Don Sharpe and Joe Bajan at Mt. Washington for the perfect preparation of the tracks! Thanks to that we could conduct specific training sessions which really helped us a lot."

"It helps to aim at the target"
The collection in Canada was not only the first training camp for the team after the season; it was also the first training camp for the new coach of the National A-Team, Armin Auchentaller. Together with head-coach Per Nilsson the former Italian coach made sure to deal with the individual problems the athletes identified during the last season - or as Russell Currier put it: "Both coaches gave me a lot of tips and some drills to bring up the shooting. Apparently it helps to aim at the target. I know it sounds a little obvious but sometimes I can get a little too carried away." For Haley Johnson who trained together with the men in Whistler, the camp brought a lot of improvement as well: "I entered as one athlete and excited as another; I made huge improvements in both my skiing and shooting techniques."

The next chance to make further improvements will follow for Johnson from June 14th to July 4th in Fort Kent at the camp for the women's B-Team. The men's A-team will have its next collection in Lake Placid from June 21st to July 12th.